When Anna's deaf student asked why everyone was staring at him, she decided to be honest. 

It’s a truth universally acknowledged that teachers play a special role in their students’ lives – with many of them going beyond the basic requirements of their jobs by providing things such as food and stationery for the children in their classes.

But one teacher in Washington DC has a particularly heartwarming story of something that happened in her classroom. Anna Trupiano, who works at Kendall Demonstration Elementary School, posted about the incident on Facebook.

“Today in 1st grade one of my deaf students farted loudly in class and other students turned to look at them,” she began.

“The following is a snippet of a 15-minute conversation that happened entirely in American Sign Language among the group of deaf students and I.”

The six-year-old in the class asked her why the other students were looking at him. Trupiano was honest in her response.

“Because they heard you fart,” she replied. “Hearing people can hear farts.”

The student was initially “horrified”, and the news prompted another student to ask, “Wait, they can hear all farts?”

Trupiano decided to give them the full picture.

“You know how sometimes you can feel your butt move when you fart? A lot of those they can hear. But if your butt doesn’t move it’s more likely they didn’t hear it,” she told them.

The first child was very upset by this news, and demanded, “TELL THEM TO STOP LISTENING TO MY FARTS! THAT IS NOT NICE!”

But Trupiano calmly explained that farting is natural, and everyone farts – including her, and all of their parents. This information caused the class to break out into a fit of giggles.

“I went to college for 8 years to have these conversations,” Trupiano humorously concluded her post.

At the time of publication, the post was liked 21 000 times, and shared more than 10 000 times. Most of the comments were very supportive of the teacher’s refreshing honesty about a normal bodily function.

“Best conversation ever,” one person commented.

“I am crying with laughter,” said another.

“I love these innocent but so very interesting discussions kids have,” one mother wrote.

Trupiano recently added an update to the now viral story, using it as an opportunity to raise awareness about the experience of deaf and hearing impaired people.

“Wow!! I cannot believe this post has gotten so much attention, but I guess it turns out farts are pretty universally funny. If you enjoyed it, and don’t know American Sign Language or the Deaf Community this might be a great time to dive in!”

Expressing that it’s so important for children to learn from anything that happens in their day, she added, “Whether that means learning about the solar system, the candy options at a store, or even farts it would be so great for them to have that language access anywhere they go.”

It is clear Trupiano is thrilled that her post has caused such a global effect, because teaching is so meaningful to her.

“I am so incredibly privileged to be a part of these students lives,” she said, “and this is just such a reminder of how lucky I am!”